What should I do if I doubt my salvation?

You have our fullest sympathy. We have met many of God's dear children in precisely your condition. Indeed they have, in stating their exercises, used your very words. “This,” you will say, “is poor comfort for me.” And yet it may not be so. We know a very dear saint of God who was under exercise for years and the only thing that gave him the smallest comfort was Psalm 88. Why? Because there was not a single bit of comfort in it. Yet it was written by a saint of God. Therefore she might be a saint, though she was thoroughly miserable. We write not thus, dear friend, to lead you to be content in your present dark and unhappy condition. Far from it. We beseech you to look off from your feelings, your experiences, your evidences and your faith itself, and rest in Christ and His finished work. God is satisfied with Christ on your behalf. Is He not enough to satisfy you? Do you want to add something of your own to Christ? This is really the question. May God bless you!

p426 DEAR MRS. -, - I dare say you are a nervous person, and your mind upset by it, and this doctor's word thus took possession of it. But if you had peace with God, it would give you a rest and quietness of spirit, which would greatly relieve you. Now I do not doubt that God has wrought in your soul, and therefore all is yours; but the first effect of His working is to distress and trouble us, because we cannot say that all is ours, and then look to our state and our fruit and our feelings, to know if we are His; that is, we look to the work of the Spirit in us, and so to the imperfect fruits in us, of His working, which cannot give us rest, and ought not. Jesus does not say, Find out your state, and you shall have rest, but, "Come unto me, all ye that labour, and are heavy laden," as you are, "and I will give you rest." Our rest comes not from our being what He wants, but His being what we want. He has made peace by the blood of the cross. That is all settled for those who believe in Him, as you do; but then, besides that, He has a tender gracious care over, and interest in us, can be touched with the feeling of our infirmities. As to our conscience, He has done what purges our sins, and so our conscience. As it is written, "Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputes not iniquity," and for this God will have nothing but Christ's work known by faith, no feelings or fruits or anything; we believe it only, that it may be by grace. Otherwise we should have our part, and be able to boast, but then the tender loving kindness of Christ enters into all our trials and weaknesses.

Dear Christian reader, what say you to these things? Can you rejoice in this blessed liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free? or are you fearing, and doubting, and trembling as to your eternal prospects? If so, why is it? Have you not long ago renounced all thoughts of creature righteousness? Have you not long felt that you are a vile sinner before God? Do you not often groan over your uncleanness? Have you not fled to Christ alone for salvation? Do you not renounce every other ground of acceptance but in Christ? And do you not trust wholly in His blood? Then why are you fearful, seeing it is such that Christ hath made free? Oh! look away from yourself, and every other object, to Christ crucified, risen, and ascended believe that He hath done what God declares He has, and be assured that it is because the Spirit hath quickened you that you have been convinced of sin, and been brought as a guilty, needy one to the Saviour. Be comforted, then, dear trembling child of God, for it is because the Lord hath loved you with an everlasting love, that with loving-kindness He hath drawn you to Himself through Christ and the testimony of His word is, that your sins are forgiven, you are justified from all things, you shall not come into condemnation, you have everlasting life — you have passed from death unto life; Christ is your righteousness and life; He ever lives to make intercession for you; and He bids you to be of good cheer, and to go in peace. Rest, then, in God's faithfulness to His own word; for "He cannot deny Himself." May the Holy Spirit take of these precious things of Christ, and reveal them for much blessing and comfort to your soul.

"Could I be sure," said a troubled soul to the preacher one evening, "of the very time, circumstances, and means of my conversion, I should be quite happy." Happiness resting on such a foundation, she was told, would not last long. Satan would soon beat her in argument and plunge her soul in deeper troubles than ever. Then how can I be sure, many will be ready to inquire, that I am converted? If you are now really caring to be assured that you are converted, most likely you are. Both the desire and that which satisfies it must come from God. But the word of God alone can give assurance. "Look unto me and be ye saved," are the Lord's own words. From the first moment that the eye looks to Christ as the Saviour, the soul is beyond all question saved. It may not believe it; it may be judging of its state by its feelings; it may be miserable, even on the brink of despair; but the word of God must ever be true notwithstanding. "Look unto me and be ye saved." Our unbelief cannot make the word of God untrue, but it hinders our enjoyment of Christ and salvation.

“These things have I written to you that ye may know that ye have eternal life, who believe on the Name of the Son of God” (JND). It may easily be the case that one may have eternal life, and yet not know it. For this very reason John has written. Not that this is the only reason, for other definite reasons are also mentioned in ch.1:3; 1:4; 2:1. The Father desires none of His children in doubt as to the precious reality of their possessing now the matchless gift of eternal life. Apart from the Word of God we could never have this assurance: it is a Divine revelation, not by means of personal introspection, feelings, or experiences, but by the written Word. This alone gives certainty. If one truly believes in the Name of the Son of God, he has eternal life, whether he realizes it or not. Scripture says so; and by Scripture alone can he realize it, and be absolutely assured. What matchless grace then that God has given us His Word!

Having, in this parenthesis, reminded them of the source of all real spiritual power, he takes up the challenge of some as to whether Christ was speaking in him. This was virtually a challenge as to whether he was really a Christian. In answer to this the Apostle says, "Examine yourselves whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves." Did they question if Christ was in him, let them look to themselves as to whether Christ was in them, for if not they were reprobates — one cast out and good for nothing. That they were in the faith through Paul's preaching should have been an unanswerable proof that Christ had spoken through him. There is no suggestion in the Apostle's words that the Christian is to look within in order to assure himself that he is a Christian. It is the outward look to Christ risen that gives the inward peace, and the word of God that gives assurance. When the Lord appeared among His disciples on the day of the resurrection, He found them troubled by thoughts arising in their hearts. At once He dispels their fears by directing their gaze to Himself. He says, "Behold my hands and my feet that it is I myself" (Luke 24:36-39). Looking within filled them with doubts and fears; looking without at their risen Lord, they at once saw in His hands and feet the proofs that He had died for them, and that He was risen, and this brought peace and joy into their hearts.

When the Apostle tells these saints to examine themselves as to whether they be in the faith, he is saying as it were, "Because of my infirmities you have wrongly raised a question as to whether Christ be in me; but apply this question to yourselves and you will see how wrong it is." Having learnt the folly of their question, he trusted that they would realise that he was no reprobate.

Is there some reader of these lines who lacks assurance? Are you a prey to doubts and fears as to your salvation? What you need is to receive the witness of the Spirit in "full assurance of faith," as verse 22 puts it. Could more reliable witness be presented to you than that of God, the Holy Ghost? No! Could His witness be presented to you in a more stable or more satisfactory form than in the Scriptures of truth, which He has inspired? We venture to say, it could not.

Again, you may easily conceive there were some inside the blood-stained door-posts who were the subjects of doubts and fears, and otherwise lacking comfort. Why? Because they forgot that all their safety was in the blood. If they were taken up with self, their own doings, feelings, fitness, and the like, they would surely be unhappy; but if their minds and hearts rested on the two things God had given them — the blood for a token, and His word for assurance — they would find it an effectual remedy for all doubts and fears. Trusting, then, wholly in the blood, and relying only on what God said about it, would be enough to keep them in perfect peace. And so now, God declares that Jesus has made peace by the blood of His cross, and He now proclaims peace to every one that believeth. And those who do believe, trusting only in the blood of Christ, and relying on what God says, that "whosoever believeth in Him shall not perish," they have peace with God. Oh yes, God's testimony to the all-cleansing virtue of the blood of Jesus is the remedy. for all doubts and fears. That precious blood withers up all fleshly confidence, and silences every accusing of conscience; for it tells of sins judged and cleansed. The blood speaks to us of God's perfect love, even when we were dead in sins; it tells us of peace made, of redemption accomplished, of a new and living way into the holiest, of title to everlasting glory.

Remember feelings always follow faith, but are absolutely unreliable as a ground of assurance. Do you believe in Christ? Are all your hopes in Him? If so, then surely this is enough for you. “All that believe are justified from all things.”

Now you will see that that is just where the heart through Satan's subtlety is probably timid. They are afraid to confess faith in Christ less they may not speak the truth. They say “Oh, I do not doubt Jesus, but I doubt myself”. Well, you may well doubt yourself. There is no good in yourself. You are as bad as you can be. “In me, (that is, in my flesh), dwelleth no good thing”, says the apostle Paul. Why should you doubt yourself? There is not one good thing in poor fallen human nature. From the day that Satan dropped the poison of unbelief into the hearts of Adam and Eve there has not been a good thing in the human heart, I mean God-ward. From the day that Adam and Eve were poisoned by the Serpent there has not been a good thing in your heart or mine. Well then, why do you doubt your heart? There is no good in doubting it, is there? Do you doubt Christ? No? Well, what do you doubt?